Medieval Woman by Ann Baer

Author:Ann Baer
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781782430582
Publisher: Michael O'Mara
Published: 2012-11-03T00:00:00+00:00

AUGUST

When the sun stoops to meet the western sky

And noons hot hours have wandered weary bye

They seek an awthorn bush or willow tree

Or stouk or shock where coolest shadows be

Where baskets heapd and unbroachd bottles lye

Which dogs in absence watchd with wary eye

To catch their breath awhile and share the boon

Which beavering time alows their toil at noon

Without opening her eyes, Marion rolled over and stretched. Her foot encountered Peterkin’s back, but he did not move. Automatically her right hand swung out to the cradle and felt Alice’s warm sleeping body. Her left hand, equally automatically stretched out to touch Peter, but it encountered nothing but cool crumbling straw. This woke her properly and she opened her eyes. The grey gloomy dawn of this late August day was visible over the half-door and it dimly lit the interior of the cottage. The familiar lump which was Peter, was not there and she remembered with a pang the events of two days ago. Peter had been chosen to be one of the small group of people to go with Sir Hugh to Rutherford to enquire about, and if possible, to bring back, salt.

The unease that had slowly been building up in the village since June over the nonappearance of the men from Rutherford with sacks and jars of salt to be exchanged for spun wool had come to an audible climax at the Harvest Supper. Not that the harvest was really complete – there was much gleaning to be done everywhere, some strips of corn were still to be cut and carried, and all the threshing was yet to do, but the bulk of the corn harvest was over, and as the weather had mainly been satisfactory, the villagers had by and large a feeling of achievement and less anxiety of a meagre winter diet. But at the Harvest Supper, held this year in the Hall as the weather looked too threatening to have it on the Green, Tom had started the salt discussion.

Sir Hugh, by long tradition, had provided a young bullock for the feast, and Tom had dismembered it and prepared a good fire in the Hall. The large joints had been roasted, with Joan and Ed-me-boy taking turns with the longest wooden ladle to pour the running fat over the meat.

When Milly had brought in the ale and Hilda had gone round the tables with her basket of small loaves, and all the villagers, exhausted by the long toil of harvest, were silently eating the thick slices of roast veal that Tom had smacked down on their bread, then Tom had said loudly, ‘It’s fresh meat today, men, and it will be fresh meat next week if we kill the other bullock, but after that there will be no meat from the farm all the long winter through if we have no salt.’

Marion suspected this raising of the subject had been rehearsed. An uneasy murmur resulted, mixed with sounds of mastication.

Then Rollo spoke. ‘The salt men from Rutherford have never been so late – after harvest now – in all my memory.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.